


I Think My Ways Are Wearing Me Down (honey, look at me tell me what you took, what'd you take?)

by sa00harine



Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti), IT - Stephen King
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, F/M, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, M/M, Panic Attacks, ben hanscom does NOT get enough love, graphic descriptions of stomach pumping (sorry), heartwrenching fluff, on the menu we have.., pure angst + recovery, this is purely ben centric (bentric)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-30
Updated: 2019-11-30
Packaged: 2021-02-25 20:42:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,434
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21611674
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sa00harine/pseuds/sa00harine
Summary: Ben Hanscom Takes a Drink-“We don’t know for sure, but he ingested dangerous amounts of alcohol and after consulting the medical team, we think he needs to get his stomach pumped within the next hour.”Beverly slaps a hand over her mouth, muffling a weeping noise that preambles Eddie rambling about the risk factors and Bill’s hysterical, now stutter-heavy monosyllables. Stan says nothing, just stares blankly at Mike.
Relationships: Ben Hanscom/Beverly Marsh, Ben Hanscom/Bill Denbrough, Ben Hanscom/Eddie Kaspbrak, Ben Hanscom/Mike Hanlon, Ben Hanscom/Richie Tozier, Ben Hanscom/Stanley Uris, Bill Denbrough/Mike Hanlon/Ben Hanscom/Eddie Kaspbrak/Beverly Marsh/Richie Tozier/Stanley Uris, OT7 - Relationship, Poly Losers Club - Relationship
Comments: 7
Kudos: 143





	I Think My Ways Are Wearing Me Down (honey, look at me tell me what you took, what'd you take?)

**Author's Note:**

> Just a little reminder- if you don't like any of the tags I tagged, please be careful while reading this. I tried to keep it to a minimum but I don't want to freak anyone out! Stomach pumping is a serious thing, and so is alcohol consumption. 
> 
> Stay safe, everyone <3
> 
> I hope you enjoy this fic of the losers (also me) loving Ben Hanscom. It's what he deserves.

It’s half past nine when Eddie drives Mike and Beverly into the driveway. They’d been out to dinner as a celebration for Beverly’s first ever collaberation with her favorite brand- well,  _ this  _ month’s favorite- Ralph Lauren. The rest would have gone if not for Bill’s sudden burst of inspiration and Richie’s abrupt gig. Stan had stayed in, since he’d had a long week at work, but Beverly didn’t mind- he’s the one who stood by her in the long nights modelling the designs that were now launched in stores. 

Stanley looks up from his book as the door opens, revealing to him Eddie carrying an ecstatic Bev and a slightly tipsy Mike to follow them inside. They’re all laughing freely and the sight warms Stan’s heart as he follows them into the kitchen. 

“Don’t you dare drop her,” he warns Eddie, who was inching Beverly’s squirming body into one of their wooden chairs. 

Eddie gasps in mock offense as he places her down. She kisses his cheek before making grabby hands at the glasses of ice water Stanley was retrieving from the fridge. 

A pair of strong arms circles his waist. Stan leans back into them, holding back a huff of breath when Mike’s lips tickle his ear. “You poured those for us?” 

“Of course I did.” 

Stan hands Beverly her glass and slides one smoothly across their table so that it reaches Eddie, who was lounging with his butt in one seat and his feet in another. Mike taps his ankles as he sits down, hefting Eddie’s feet into his lap and removing his shoes. 

“You won’t believe this-” starts Eddie. 

Beverly nearly chokes on her water. “No! You promised you would let me tell it!” 

“Tell what,” prompts Stan, leaning against the counter with his own glass raised to his lips. He watches in amusement while Eddie shakes his head at her and grimaces as Mike peels off his socks. 

“Don’t leave those in the kitchen, Mikey, that’s disgusting. Germs can stay in fabrics for up to like, a week, and I don’t want that where we  _ eat.”  _

“Want me to put them back on your feet then?” 

Eddie revokes his right foot before Mike can reach for it, wrinkling his nose at Mike. “Eugh, no. Gimme.” 

Eddie mounds the socks into a ball and catapults them into the living room. With a distinct sound, they land on the couch. Once he’s satisfied, he leans into Mike and gestures for Beverly to talk. 

She clears her throat. “Okay, so, we went out at that nice restaurant Ben took us to for our anniversary last year, and you know how they dress really nice?” 

Beverly doesn’t wait for Stanley to nod, only launches into her next point. He peeks at Mike watching her with incredibly soft eyes and Eddie playing with her outstretched hand. At the domestic sight, a smile eases across his face as she talks. 

“When our waitress came up to our table to take our orders, she was wearing this black skirt that looked  _ super familiar  _ and I just thought I’d worked with the designer so I told her it was cute and-” 

“It was  _ your  _ brand, Bev!” Eddie downs his glass and slams it to the table with enough enthusiasm that Stan is surprised it didn’t shatter. 

“It was  _ my  _ brand, Stan! The skirt I put out, uh, two years ago? They implemented it into their uniform! And the waitress- her name was Nellie, she was acting all shy because she knew it was me, and I  _ love  _ her, she was so sweet.” 

“It was your brand, turtledove.” He recalls the exact skirt she was referencing- namely because they had an infamous photo of her using Richie to model it and the comedian had had to be stopped from using it as the promotional photo for one of his tours. “I remember the skirt. It was lovely, I’m not surprised.”

Mike laughs when Beverly beams at him. They share a moment, looking at Beverly like she put the stars in the sky. Then the stairs creak and Bill enters the kitchen, rubbing at his eyes. 

“Hey,” he says, voice laden and gravelly with obvious sleepiness. “I wrote eleven and a h-half pages.” 

“Fuck yeah, Bill,” mutters Eddie. 

Applause emits from around the table. Stanley gives Bill a smile and a cup of water. He’d had an extra ready for when Bill decided to leave his office. 

Bill sits on the floor, head against Mike’s thigh and eyes fluttering shut when Eddie reaches over and ran a hand through his hair. “How was dinner?”

It’s Mike who volunteers and answer this time, exchanging a joyful look with Beverly before recapping her words and an extravagant description of somebody’s dog who they came across on their way in. Bill listens, nodding at every other word and sipping from his cup. And Stan watches, because he’s never been much of a talker. He’s merely content to watch the four of them chatter animatedly. 

When Mike wraps up his spiel, Bill tugs Beverly’s hand and kisses up to her arm before- even after seven years of being in a relationship- she yanks it away, giggling. 

Her laughter is interrupted by her phone suddenly buzzing from her jean pocket. She picks it up, showing them that it’s Richie. 

“How was the show, Rich?

“Oh, yeah. Everyone’s home, Ben’s still out with his co-workers… great!

“You always do this, I swear if you’re only doing this to tell a joke I’ll- geez, okay fine, since you’re being all whiny.” 

Beverly rolls her eyes and tells them she’s putting Richie on speaker phone. His voice comes through- pitchy and overridden by static but Richie nonetheless. “ _ Hello! Hi, for once this isn’t a joke. I did the skit- the thing about the time when you got me a birthday cake that said ‘bitch’ instead of ‘babe’ and I was just thinking about that and did you guys know that I love you a lot?”  _

“We do, Richie,” says Bill, smiling at the phone. 

“ _ Like, a lot a lot?”  _

Mike holds out his hand and Beverly tosses her phone into his palm across the table. Stan shoves down the little burst of worry that rose in him while it was in the air. Mike caught it. He speaks lowly into the speaker. “We love you ‘a lot, a lot’ too.” 

“ _ Mikey! You’re gonna make me blush and it’s only me and my Uber driver in here!”  _

“I could have driven you home, dumbass,” Eddie grouses, snatching the phone from Mike’s hand. “I drove Mike and Bev.” 

“ _ And who am I to overwork my chauffeur, baby? I’ve got- hey, what’s your name if you don’t mind me asking?-  _ an unfamiliar voice, deep and likely entertained by Richie’s antics, replies unintelligibly-  _ I’ve got Adrian to drive me home. I’ll be there in five.”  _

Richie hangs up, and laughter resounds in the kitchen when Eddie gapes at the phone in his hand. He hands it back to Beverly. 

She puts it on the table and hums. “I think, since we’ll all be home soon, we should watch a movie.” 

“You just want to cuddle.” Eddie points at her. 

“Maybe, Eds. Problem?” 

He grins at her. “None at all.” 

“They had bundles of blankets on sale yesterday, I got a few,” Mike makes sure to mention. 

Stan flicks his shoulder. “Where were they when the AC was malfunctioning this morning?” 

“My room,” Mike says sheepishly. 

Just then, Richie walks in the door, a frenzy dressed in a neon green shirt with magenta lava lamps scattered across it. His jeans are equally offending- dark, ripped, and displaying white paint across the left pant leg- from the day Bill persuaded them to help paint his office. 

Stan meets him halfway, staring flatly at his pants. “You wore paint-stained jeans to a show?”

“My dearly beloved, why must you hurt me so?” Richie drawls ridiculously, coming in for a hug, which Stan accepts. They all give him hugs then, and small murmurs of  _ congratulations,  _ because it’s become tradition when Richie comes home late, wired and tired after performing, that they remind him how well he did. He got insecure during the best of times, and of course the other six of them found it essential to keep the insecurities at bay. 

“When’s Benny-boy getting home? I miss that hunk of man. If there’s a chest I want to fall asleep on, it’s his,” says Richie, falling back onto the couch. 

Stan goes after him, closely followed by Eddie and Beverly. “Within the next hour, it’s almost ten.” 

Eddie crawls beside Richie on the couch, melting into his side. Carefully, Stan tucks himself into Richie’s other side, making room for Beverly on his left. She leans on his chest, kicking her feet up over Richie and Eddie’s laps. 

“ _ Bring me a man after midnight…”  _ Beverly sing-songs. 

Pulling up a playlist on his phone, Richie plays them music consisting of ABBA, Queen, and the Beastie Boys while they lay, in and out of dozing comfortably.

-

The one who wakes up first is Eddie. He extracts himself from under Richie’s arm with grace that he’s built up mastery of over years of experience. The house is strange-  _ the world  _ is strange, and he blames it on the hazy, post-nap allure that he feels every time he sinks into the damned couch. Eddie listens to Freddie Mercury’s  _ The Great Pretender,  _ the buzzing of the heater, and the mellow sound of Mike and Bill talking from the kitchen. 

He takes one last glance at the rest on the couch- Stan’s chest rising up-down up-down steadily, his face relaxed and open in sleep, and to Richie, snoring lightly with his glasses askew and his arm around Beverly, who slept with a dreamy smile that made Eddie light on his feet as he left.

Mike and Bill are the same as when Eddie had left. Mike sitting in his chair, and Bill on the tile with his head resting on Mike’s thigh. They both turn to look at him as he walks in. 

“Is Ben back yet?” The clock indicates that it’s a quarter past ten, and there’s no sign of him anywhere. The least Eddie would expect is a text. Unreasonable worry starts to bubble in his stomach, and he takes a seat near Bill, always gravitating towards him in times of trouble. 

A soft head of hair falls into the junction of his neck and shoulder. Though it tickles, Eddie doesn’t move. He’s fine as long as Bill’s comfortable. 

“He isn’t. He told me he’d be back by eleven at the latest, though,” Mike says. 

“Okay,” replies Eddie. 

-

A considerable warmth gone from his side, Richie stirs to a lack of Eddie but an abundance of Stanley and Bev. He moves closer to them, minding the fact that Ben still wasn’t home. If Ben were home, his satchel would be in its place by the door and hopefully he’d have been in on their little cuddle pile. Richie idly pictured him- maybe on his other side with Bev or precisely where Eddie had left. Either way, he wanted Ben  _ here.  _

He slips into sleep again before he could think too much about it anymore. 

It isn’t long before he’s woken up again, this time by the sound of feet stiffly hitting their wood floors. He opens one eye to see Eddie pacing through the house. 

“Eds,” he calls. 

Eddie’s head turns sharply, eyes wide like a deer in the headlights. 

“What’s up?” He pats the couch. Begrudgingly, Eddie sits, still bouncing his leg rapidly. 

“Ben isn’t home yet. It’s eleven-thirty.” 

Richie gently rubs at Eddie’s shoulders with his free hand- the one Stanley wasn’t clinging too, and sees how they drop an inch. “It’s a Friday night, babycakes, there’s probably traffic.” 

“Don’t call me that.” Eddie swats at him with his hand and Richie catches it, holding it to his chest. They share a look, only broken by the phone ringing and Bill bringing it out to them. 

“Ih-It’s Bev’s.” 

Creating a tiny ripple, Richie elbows Stanley, who jolts awake and twitches enough for Beverly to pop back into consciousness with a small, confused sound. She looks around, sleepy little smile coming across her features when she sees them all there plus Mike leaning in the kitchen doorway. 

She takes the phone from Bill’s hand and Stanley stifles a yawn, squinting at the phone screen. “It’s Ben.” 

They excitedly gather around on the couch to hear from the last link of the lucky seven. Although, what comes from the speaker is definitely not Ben’s voice. It’s soft, sweet, and female. 

“Hello?” 

“Hi,” Beverly says, looking around and noting that they’re all as dumbfounded as her.

“Is this Beverly Marsh? You’re Ben Hanscom’s emergency contact, yes?” 

Their hearts drop. Richie feels Eddie’s shoulders stiffen up under his hand and rubs them until they ease down again. He shares a quick look with Bill, who is staring intensely at the phone as the lady continues talking once Beverly offers a shaky  _ that’s me.  _

“He’s in the hospital.” 

Richie sits up. “What, why-” 

“-No, no no no no no-” Eddie’s leg bounces faster. 

“What happened?” Mike’s voice is the most grounded of all of theirs, so Beverly passes him the phone. 

“We don’t know for sure, but he ingested dangerous amounts of alcohol and after consulting the medical team, we think he needs to get his stomach pumped within the next hour.” 

Beverly slaps a hand over her mouth, muffling a weeping noise that preambles Eddie rambling about the risk factors and Bill’s hysterical, now stutter-heavy monosyllables. Stan says nothing, just stares blankly at Mike. 

“What hospital is he located at?” 

Once the woman gives them the information, Stanley reaches for the notepad on their table and scribbles it down in cursive that’s messier than his usual orderly lettering. While he’s writing, Richie stands up and walks into the hallway towards the bathroom. 

Behind his back, Mike and Bill, then Bill and Eddie, and Eddie and Bev, exchange glances. 

Their growing superstition is answered when the unmistakable sound of gagging comes from the bathroom. They all had their nervous ticks- how Eddie would fidget or talk fast or how Bill’s stutter would return with a vengeance even after years and years of speech therapy, even how Stanley would go so quiet you’d almost forget he was there, but Richie’s was likely the worst. When he got stressed or filled with nerves, his first response was to empty the contents of his stomach. There hadn’t yet been an opening night of his tour when he hadn’t puked before sauntering out onto the stage. Nor had there been any shortage of clothes he’d ruined. 

With a curse under his breath, Eddie goes after him. 

When he nudges open the door, Richie is hunched on the tile, arms bracketing the toilet seat while he coughs into it. His glasses had fallen off in his haste. Eddie picks them up and plops down next to him. 

Wordlessly, he rubs Richie’s back as he dry heaves. “It’s okay, Rich. It’s okay, it’ll all be fine, baby. Stanley’s gonna drive us to the hospital and we’re gonna see him.” 

“Why did he drink that much? He has to get his stomach pumped, Eds, that’s-” 

Eddie was notorious for freaking out, but something compelled him to calm down when anyone else was unsteady, even if he was still afraid. That’s what he did with Richie. He turned him away from the toilet, reached to flush it, and put on his glasses. Richie sniffled. 

“We don’t know. We don’t know, but once he’s awake and we can talk to him, we can go from there.” 

Richie nods. “Okay. Can I change? I don’t want to show up to Ben’s bedside wearing something hideous.” 

“Ben will love you even when you wear something as ugly as that, but go ahead. I’ll be in the car.” 

He gets up to leave, then pokes his head back through the door last minute. Richie was wiping at his cheeks, trying to scrub away the tear stains. Eddie smiles. He was always trying to act brave. He was so brave. They all were. They would stay that way even when they saw Ben. 

“And Richie?” 

“Yeah?” 

“Brush your fucking teeth.” 

-

When Richie comes back, tucked into a greenish blue hoodie that most definitely belongs to Ben, the rest are in Stanley’s car save for Mike. He climbs into the backseat right between Eddie and Beverly, and Bill reaches for his hand on Eddie’s other side. He holds it tight. 

Stan turns down the volume on the radio, but says nothing. Even as Mike settles into the passenger seat- carrying Ben’s sweatpants and a clean shirt joined by a sweatshirt, he stares at the moon through the window without a word. 

He starts driving after Mike kisses his cheek. 

“I stayed on the phone with her for a while.. she said we can’t go in and see him right now. Only family or spouses are allowed,” Beverly says after a few minutes. 

“Technically we’re his spouses,” grumbles Eddie. “Just not… conventionally.”

Bill takes a deep breath before he talks, obviously a frail attempt at combatting his stuttering. “I c-called his m-m-m-mother. Sh-she’s gonna catch the nuh-next f-flight.” 

He relaxes a little when Beverly rubs his back. 

“We’re almost there,” Mike tells them. 

They all inhale together. The brightest thing in the car are Stan’s white knuckles on the steering wheel.

-

It takes a while for them to actually get into the hospital- Richie doubled over to puke as soon as he got out of the car, which caused the valet person to think  _ he  _ was the one who was being hospitalized, and they all kept trying not to burst into tears. 

Once they’re in the light of the building, Stanley finally speaks. His voice is hoarse with the lump in his throat. He’s looking at Richie. “You’re still wearing those fucking jeans? Really, Richie?” 

Richie wipes his mouth. “Stan, please not now, I-” 

“No, no. They’re  _ wrecked.  _ There’s more holes than actual denim and I can’t stop focusing on the paint on the side- you have other jeans, I don’t understand why you just didn’t wear those.” 

“Stan,  _ Stan.  _ This isn’t you, it’s the OCD talking. I know everything gets worse when you’re stressed, but we’re all there with you so can-”

“ _ Shut up, Richie.”  _

The man looks taken aback by the venom dripping from Stan’s tone. And Mike can practically see the gears turning in his head while he forms a retaliation. 

While Bill gives Eddie a cautious look, Beverly intervenes. She weaves in between them and opens the door. 

“Tonight isn’t about you guys. It’s about Ben, and if you both need to drive home in order for us to support him, then drive. We can get an uber in the morning. If you want to be here for him, then get yourself together and stop causing a scene,” she says sweetly, curtly turning and walking through the door. Eddie goes after, doleful eyes lingering on them. 

Mike gently lays a hand on each of their shoulders before he catches up with Eddie. And Bill, carrying Ben’s extra set of clothes, gives them a  _ puh-please k-keep it together f-for us  _ as he walks ahead. Richie and Stan elect to walk on either side of him. 

-

They’ve been in the emergency room for fifteen minutes and the only indication that Ben is actually there were the papers Beverly signed consenting for his stomach to be pumped. 

She passes the clipboard to one of the nurses. “Thank you,” she says, a tear falling to her chin. Mike opens his arms and she falls into them. Bill smiles at the nurse as she leaves. 

“When do you think we’ll be able to visit him?” Eddie asks. 

“I d-duh- _ don’t  _ know.”

Stan and Richie sit on either side of Mike, Bev, and Bill, both silent. 

-

They’ve been in the emergency room for thirty minutes. Eddie is scanning through his phone, reading to them what they can find about stomach pumping. “There’s a tube in his mouth- his esophagus, that goes to his stomach, and they pump from that, basically.” 

“Thanks for vetoing the medical terms, Eds,” says Richie, voice startlingly hollow. “Some of us don’t understand ‘ gastric suction.’”

None of them respond. Bill has resorted to on-and-off scrolling through his phone, periodically calling Ben’s mother with a lack of updates, and looking around on edge. Next to him, Stanley is a statue- unmoving and almost unblinking. Mike does as much as he can, offering occasional words of faith and physical touch- hugs and hands to hold. Beverly just keeps crying. Her thoughts are loud-  _ what if he’s not okay? Why did he drink this much?  _ And they are relentless, lapsing her into a new fit of tears every passing minute. 

Bill leaves the sixth voice mail to Ben’s mother and sits forward. He ducks his head, physically feeling the fight he’d had as a kid- leading the losers around everywhere- leave him. Hopefully it reached Ben, who really needed it. 

-

They’ve been in the emergency room for an hour, and an hour is what it took for six lovers to break in the absence of their seventh piece. Each time one of them walks up to the table to ask about Ben’s condition, the nurses smile and say the same thing: He’s unconscious right now. The operation is done, he’ll be awake soon. 

Well, there’s only a certain amount of soon’s that Eddie can take before he’s ready to test his chances in finding Ben’s room himself. Eddie sits down stiffly after his third try, making a grand total of nine tries from the six of them. 

It’s like glass shattering, how the exact moment he slumps is the exact moment Richie and Beverly cry again, and the same moment Bill buries his face in Stan’s shoulder, and the  _ same moment  _ Mike inhales loudly and wipes at his reddened eyes. 

“I juh-just w-w-w-w-w-” 

“He thrusts his fists against the posts,” Stanley says softly, cradling Bill’s head against his chest. He’d been crying the whole time- eyes looking bloodshot and nose all stuffy. 

Bill takes his time regulating his breathing. “He th-thrusts his f-f-fists ag-against the p-posts.” 

Gingerly, Stan moves Bill so they can look at each other face to face. “Yeah, blue jay, yeah.” He smiles, lip quivering infinitesimally. Bill smiles back. “And still insists he sees the ghosts.” 

“And s-still insists he sees t-the ghosts.” 

Beverly pats his knee and Bill puts his hand on top of hers. “I just w-want to see him.” 

“We will.” They appreciate how Mike leaves the ‘soon’ unsaid. 

“Hey,” says Richie. “Remember when it was Beverly’s birthday two years ago and he tried to get all of us to hide so that we could surprise her?” 

“... And he forgot the birthday cake in his car?” Eddie asks, a hint of a smile coming across his face. 

Beverly remembers, sitting up. “His car was at the dealership and we made cookies instead.” 

“I had to p-pick him up in college when he got locked in his s-s-school overnight because he wuh-was at the 3d printer f-for so long.” 

Richie grins. “Was that when he made us all Christmas ornaments?” 

Bill nods. “He m-m-made me a replica of S-Silver.” 

“I keep the fanny pack he gave me on my desk year around,” says Eddie. 

“Me too,” Stan replies, referring to Star of David Ben gifted him- they put it on top of the tree every year now- a blend of both of Holidays that satisfied Stan and the rest. Stan kept the ornament on his bookshelf.

“If we’re getting into Ben stories, we have to bring up the time he got me and Beverly to help him hide a homeless guy in one of the apartment buildings he built because it was raining cats and dogs outside,” Mike says. 

Eddie shakes his head fondly. “He could have gotten fired.”

“The guy has a job now- at the cafe on seventeenth,” Beverly says. 

“One time at the gym I saw him tell off this guy who was being creepy to a girl. He actually yelled a little, and walked her back to her car.” 

Mike nods. “Ben’s an angel.” 

Beverly sighs. “You think he’s in there trying to tell his doctor he’s okay?” 

“I bet he took his nurse’s hand,” says Richie, grabbing Stan’s hand to demonstrate, and the love in both of their eyes concludes their earlier conflict has been forgotten. “And told them they were beautiful and doing a wonderful job, and that  _ I’m sorry for making you pump my stomach.”  _ His Ben Voice is top hat. Richie captured it all- down to the bass rasp and bashfulness that they so adore.

“Oh my god, he would totally apologize for that,” Eddie breathes. 

Stan shifts uncomfortably. “None of us are mad, but what are we gonna say when we talk to him? Why did he do it?” 

“Maybe he just drank a little too much,” Richie says, voice unconvincing, like he wanted to believe it but he didn’t. 

“‘Drinking a little too much’ doesn’t warrant a stomach pumping.” 

They look at Eddie, the  _ I know  _ on their faces loud enough to make him bark out a nervous laugh. “He was stressed and went in over his head, I think,” Eddie tells them. 

Mike looks uneasy. “He could’ve come to us.” 

Beverly shakes her head. “He’s the type to grin and bear it. Of course it would come to this.” 

“W-we s-s-should have worried about him earlier.” 

Richie points at Bill. “No, we can’t blame ourselves. We don’t have the time for that shit.” 

Mike looks at Richie for a moment before agreeing. “He’s already here recovering and we’re worrying for him now. That’s what matters.” 

“I-If he’s n-not okay, th-then we’ll help him until h-he is,” Bill says. 

And so they settle into silence, having soothed their ruthless worry that had been eating them alive into something peaceful. Ben would be okay- they would do anything to make sure of it. 

-

They’ve been in the emergency room for three hours, and finally, a nurse says that Ben Hanscom is awake and ready for visitors. 

It takes a tearful begging from Richie- Richie who majored in drama in college, although he’s not faking his tears this time, anybody can see that he’s in real distress and it hurts the rest of them to watch him sobbing to the nurse, but in the end he’s what got them all in to see Ben. 

“Okay, we can fit the six of you in if you don’t think he’ll be overwhelmed,” the nurse says, laying a hesitant hand on Richie’s shivering shoulders. He winks at them through a swelled up, teary eye, and they laugh a little deliriously. Though, the line between laughing and crying had been fabulously blurred since they got the news that Ben was awake. 

Stan smiles at the nurse. “I’ll keep them under control. We just want to be with him right now.” 

And so they’re guided down a series of hallways. With every step, Eddie’s mind takes him further and further down a gruesome imagining of what Ben was going through. 

He saw Ben being hustled over in his hospital bed, face slack and chafing against the rough fabric instead of the soft sheets they have at home. He saw his mouth being held open- head being tilted back just so at the ideal angle as to slip the tube into his nostrils. He felt the phantom nudging sensation of the ewald tube suffocate him.  _ Ben  _ had felt that. Eddie couldn’t imagine the milliliters of saline solution flooding into Ben’s system over and over again until finally, whatever he’d drank came up with it. 

Suddenly short of breath, Eddie stops walking. He feels Bill bump lightly against his back and turns, seeing those usually serene, but now troubled blue eyes staring back at him. 

Bill doesn’t break eye contact with Eddie as he says. “Tu-text uh-us the room number, w-we’ll be there in a s-s-sec.” 

They receive an affirmative nod from Mike, who keeps walking alongside Richie, Stan, and Beverly. 

With a guiding hand on Eddie’s bicep, Bill leads them to the nearest bench. For a while- a minute, really, but it felt so much longer- they just stare at the controlled commotion. There’s a distant sound of beeping, and a thrum rippling through the floors that was just as disorienting as it was grounding. Eddie’s leg bounces up and down, and Bill decides to initiate a game of footsie- kicking lightly at Eddie’s foot. 

Apparently, it’s the catalyst Eddie needed to talk. 

“My mom took me here all the time, I- I don’t know how she isn’t in severe debt from all the fucking hospital bills.” A dry laugh. “Every visit I’d see something that freaked me out worse. And I haven’t been back in an emergency room since that one time where you fell off our roof while putting up Halloween decorations and fractured something in your wrist, but everytime I go I remember-” Eddie shivers. Bill traces the few wrinkles in his sleeve while he gathers his bearings. “I remember how the walls seem like they’re closing in and how people have died here and how they’re ‘steile’ but not  _ that  _ sterile and how Ben was alone in there with a fucking tube in his guts and we couldn’t do anything about it!” Eddie had started to sob again at the introduction of Ben’s name and Bill reaches over to play with the hair at the nape of his neck. 

He stares intently at Eddie, who was looking up in an attempt to keep his tears from falling. A doctor walks by speedily, loudly listing off jargon to a nurse wheeling a somber patient. “We’re h-here, Eddie, and t-t-that’s enough.” 

He shakes his head. “Why did Ben do it, Bill?” 

“I don’t kn-know.” 

“He’s so smart! He would know what he was getting into- even if it wasn’t this it could have been alcohol poisoning or getting high blood pressure and sometimes blood clots are linked to drinking too much.” Eddie is panting by the end of his spiel, words coming out so fast he’d forgotten to breathe. 

They crept under Bill’s skin and procured a new round of tears to prick at his eyes. It was getting harder and harder to believe that what waited in that room would be something he wanted to see. He white-knuckles the arm of the bench, desperately willing himself not to lose his cool and yell. He can’t do that. 

“Eddie, c-can we g-g-g-go in?” 

Eddie pales and shakes his head again. “I can’t go in there.” 

“Why?”

“I can’t see him like that.” His voice cracks and Bill feels his throat hurt with the sound. 

“Yuh-you’re b-b-b-b-” 

“He thrusts his fists?” 

Bill shakes his head. He doesn’t need the rhyme. “You’re brave.” 

“Bill, you’re just saying-” 

“I am not. B-Ben w-wants to see you a-and he n-n-needs to s-see us right now. Let’s go.” He glances quickly before laying a feather-light kiss to Eddie’s cheek. He feels Eddie nod, then. 

-

It’s true that nothing could have prepared them for what they saw when they closed the door and crept past the curtain in Ben’s room. 

Ben Hanscom, looking glum and lifeless and frail, tucked in off-white stiff blankets and in a hospital gown with stains that Eddie didn’t want to ponder too long on. His face was past pale- moreso a shade of grey that made Eddie’s heart ache. He was hooked up to several machines, all of which emitted various beeping and buzzing sounds. There was an IV poked into his right arm rushing fluids into his system. Even so, he looked dehydrated still.

He dashes to Ben’s bedside, squashing himself on Stan’s lap without a care. Ben’s hand is hanging limply off the side of the bed. Eddie takes it, and tries with all his might to rub warmth into Ben’s cold,  _ cold  _ skin. 

Stan’s arms clutch and meet around Eddie’s abdomen, and he feels the barely-there press of Stan’s hair and nose against the knobs of his spine. Distantly, Richie and Bill are talking. Maybe Mike and Bev are too, but they’re so far away. The closest thing is Ben’s hand, and the fingers that just twitched in Eddie’s hold. 

His heart stops. 

“Guys.” 

On the other side of the bed, also in a bedside chair, Beverly gives Ben a teary smile as his eyes open. 

“Before you guys came in, he was awake, then he fell asleep again, and woke up- He’s just been in and out of it,” Richie says to Eddie. Eddie can’t be sure, but it sounds like Richie had repeated it once or twice and he just hadn’t heard. 

Eddie looks up, seeing the small movement that was Ben’s head lolling back against the pillows. Ben doesn’t react, only really moving his pupils as he takes in the room. His eyes close again, and then open. Then he looked shocked to the core, lurching forward with wide-eyes. 

Mike is the first to leap out of his chair- Eddie wondered how many chairs they’d dragged in for this- and put a hand on Ben’s chest. He eases him back into laying down. 

“Guh-guys. How-” Ben’s voice is past gruff, now more of a croak than anything else. It grates against their ears painfully as he keeps trying to get words out. The one who looks the most sympathetic is Bill, who knows what it’s like to try to churn words from his mouth and for them to get lodged in his throat. But this is different. “G-g-guys, I-” 

“Heya, Benny,” says Richie, reaching past Mike and Beverly to trail his thumb from Ben’s shaking shoulders to his other hand. Eddie remembers he has Ben’s hand in his own still, and does all he can to calm the man down- squeezing and furiously rubbing more heat into his hand. 

Ben chokes around another onset of words. He abruptly falls into a coughing fit, to which the rest look at each other with the same round, upset eyes. Bill stands at the foot of the bed, and makes feeble  _ ch-ch  _ noises until Ben’s hacking has run its course into tremors in his breathing. Beverly moves his hair out of his face. They hear her whisper into his ear and they think it’s better to remain quiet for a while. 

They do. In that time, Ben sits up, eyes welling with tears, and simply looks around. There’s Eddie and Beverly, parallel in chairs closest to his bed. Beverly’s hand is in his hair. He registers it dimly picking apart knots with a profound gentleness that could only ever come from her. Her fingernails dip against his scalp every so often, and he leans into it because his body is heavy and somehow weightless all at once and he feels like a fool to try to control its motion. Somewhere, between the flashes of being jostled around in an ambulance, a gurney, a bed, and being hurriedly flooded with  _ cold  _ and then not being able to breath- he got the feeling his body didn’t belong to him- that it’s been claimed by machinery and the hollow coolness that fills the air in the hospital room. Then Beverly’s hand gets caught on a knot, and he’s launched right back. Ben’s body is his, but he doesn’t quite know if he wants it or not. 

Eddie was grasping onto his hand like it was his lifeline. It’s likely the only part of Ben that felt warm, really, and that was because Eddie’s smaller hands fit right into his and seemed to transfer the temperature. He stifles a sob when Eddie pulls the sleeves of his jacket up and engulfs Ben’s hand in the fuzzy fabric. 

Then there was Richie, with his other hand. One of Richie’s hands was tinkering- not dangerously, just absentmindedly, with the IV port protruding from his inner elbow. It stirred a minimal feeling that tickled his skin. Richie’s other hand was latched with his own, holding so tightly it maybe would have hurt if Ben could clearly process anything other than sight. There was a smile on Richie’s face, and Ben saw his face pulled taut. Ironically, he was smiling brightly but his eyes sprinkled with moisture. He wasn’t blinking as Ben stared, but his body was shaking visibly. Even in crisis, Richie was a paradox- grounded but with his head in the clouds, and tugging Ben’s hand closer to his chest, where he wore one of Ben’s favored hoodies. A deep  _ pang  _ hits Ben’s heart when he recognizes it. Richie sees it and just keeps smiling. It’s all he could do. 

Standing behind Richie with his hands on the frame of the chair was Mike, looking at Ben like he was something  _ so  _ precious. Ben didn’t know if he deserved that look anymore- well,  _ ever.  _ But especially not after tonight. It was Beverly’s celebration, Richie’s show… it was supposed to be a wonderful night if not for what he'd done. He blinks. A warm tear goes down his cheek. 

“You’re thinking so loud, wren,” Stanley whispers, wiping the tear with his thumb. He was mostly obscured behind Eddie. Ben sits up as best he can, straightening his back with a tremendous effort. He felt weak. He felt like he wasn’t worthy of Stan’s adorable nicknames.  _ Ben the Wren. Ben the alcoholic, more like.  _ He exhales through his nose and yet another tear falls. 

He slumps back, the grueling effort of sitting up appearing to be too much. His eyes fight to stay open. 

Ben can’t control the tears streaming down anymore. They just keep falling and falling and falling. And through it, Mike is still looking at him like  _ that _ and Eddie and Richie continue to stroke his hands like they really do love him. He can’t take it. “I’m sorry,” he says. 

He hates the sound of his own voice- thick with tears and so feeble. He doesn’t apologize for how loud he’s thinking, he apologizes for everything. 

“Shh, it’s o-okay,” Bill says, reaching out from the edge of the bed and though he doesn’t touch Ben, Ben’s face turns to look at him, because it’s  _ Bill.  _ Bill who has never held a grudge in his life, and Bill who took them all under his wings without an ounce of judgement. That same Bill is right here, and it makes Ben sick to think about how he isn’t even mad. He should be mad, shouldn’t he? Ben fucked up. Massively. 

Ben shakes his head, freely weeping now. It all intensifies, when all he can see are vague figures behind his watery eyes and when several voices murmur sweet things at once. 

“There’s nothing to be sorry about, we all have our highs and lows,” whispers Stanley. 

“We’re here for you, Ben. You know?” 

He looks at Eddie and sees nothing but uttermost sincerity there waiting for him. Eddie continues. “I recognize that look, you’re all guilty and sorry. I know that.” He clears his throat, moving to sit up and lean closer. Stan moves with him, Ben sees his arms wrapped around Eddie. “But I swear, if you’re about to tell us that you’re fine and that we can go home and forget about it, than that stomach pumping didn’t work, because obviously you’re still drunk. Do you hear me?” 

He nods, shaking involuntarily at the words.  _ Stomach pumping.  _ If that could even cover the surreal slow-motion that was the unknown amount of hours he’d laid here, sweaty and deathly, choking around the stiff tube in his throat, and feeling his stomach churn and his gag reflex spasm intermittently. 

“We just want to know what happened, sweetie.” Beverly pats his hip under the blanket, hand revoked from his hair. He guessed it was slick with grease at this point. Of course she didn’t want to touch it. 

“Yeah,” says Richie. “You have to warn a guy before you up and drink out an entire bar.” 

Mike gives Richie a look, not exasperated, not annoyed. “Beep-beep,” he says. 

“Why aren’t-” His throat is so dry. He swallows. “How aren’t you mad at me?” 

“We could never be mad at you. We love you,” Mike tells him. 

Ben swallows again. Shakes his head. He knows he isn’t unloveable. But he doesn’t understand how six people,  _ six  _ people, and six of the most excellent people could love him this much.

Bill traces patterns on his calf under the blanket. He thinks he feels a little heart engraved there. “Is thu-that what t-this is about?”

Stanley sighs heavily. And then they all know. 

Ben wants to wither and rot under the too-hot blankets of the hospital bed. He wants to sink into the ground so that the rest of them could move on.  _ You’re only as strong as your weakest link,  _ and his insecurity, his issues, were bringing them down. 

He feels a finger flick his forehead. Ben doesn’t move. “Stop that,” Eddie says. 

“Eds, you didn’t have to hit him.” 

Eddie stares dumbly at Richie. “I didn’t hit him, you-” 

“-You flicked his forehead, that man is in the hospital, that’s so rude-” 

And Ben feels like sinking still, but their bickering makes him think floating isn’t so bad.

“I’m wounded,” Ben says sarcastically to Eddie. Eddie snorts. Probably because it's hard to take a joke from a man who can't speak above a whisper and who connected to more machines than people in the room. 

Stan adjusts Eddie so that they’re sharing the chair. "No more jokes." 

He scoots it up closer to the bed. A silence blankets them again while he puts his hand over Ben’s, which have since migrated away from Richie’s and Eddie’s grips and come to rest over his stomach. 

Stan’s eyes are dark and tired. Ben opens his mouth to apologize, because he knows he caused that- it’s his fault, but Stanley shushes him. 

“Were you mad at me when I relapsed?” 

Ben gasps a little, nothing coming out but a small squeak. “Of course not, Stan, I-” 

Stanley waves a hand to shut him up. “None of you were. You were just worried because you love me. What makes this any different?” 

“You cut yourself and I-” He gasps for breath that wasn’t coming. “I drank. I drank so much..” 

“It’s all self-harm at the end of the day. And did you guys help me recover?” 

“Yes.” 

“So don’t you think it’s right that we help you?” 

“Why?” 

Bill shakes his head with a small chuckle. “Buh-because we love y-you, damnit.” 

They all laugh. Ben huffs out a breath that could be a laugh or a sob, he can’t tell. Then he starts weeping again. He isn’t sad. He isn’t happy. He isn’t quite anything, but he’s a  _ lot  _ of it. 

“I love you guys. I love you s-so much,” he says. 

They all say it back, and Ben doesn’t have to trick himself into believing it. For the first time since he woke up, he feels sure. They left home for him. Bill left his cozy, lodgy office. Beverly dropped her dinner celebration with Eddie and Mike. And though it wasn’t what Ben wanted, it may have been what he needed. 

Mike is still looking at him warmly. Ben sags his shoulders, feeling a tightness in his back that only has exhaustion to blame. But he smiles back. 

“How are you feeling right now?” 

“Like shit,” he says honestly. 

A laugh comes from Richie. Then a wet sniffing sound. He puts his hand on Ben’s on top of Stanley’s. “You can only go up from here,” he says. 

Ben agrees. Then their little fire is extinguished by the sound of a nurse walking in. 

Everyone tenses. 

She has dark hair tied back behind her ears and a smile that looks to Ben like a warning. In her hands is a plastic cup with a vile dark substance filling it about half-way. 

“Oh,” says Eddie. “I read about this part.” 

Stan nudges him and he goes quiet. 

“Hi,” Bill says to the nurse, working his usual charisma, even at three thirty-five in the morning. 

“Hey, how is everyone?” 

They all give answers of similar degrees and she turns to Ben. “How are you feeling?” 

He gives a much kinder answer. “Fine, thanks.” 

“Glad to hear it. You may experience nausea or weakness in the next few days due to the procedure, and you’ll definitely feel fatigued. But-” She looks around the room. “-I think these guys are here to help you. Am I right?” 

“You are,” Beverly says. 

The nurse takes a seat in the sole extra chair. “So it’s a recommended follow-up that after we pump your stomach, we have you drink this- it’s a charcoal mix that’ll cleanse anything we didn’t get.” 

Eddie stiffens. “What’s the probability of you missing anything?” 

“Very low,” she assures him. “This is just for us to make sure.” 

“Okay,” Ben says, looking hesitantly at the cup in her hand. 

She places it on the table near the bed. “I’ll be back in about fifteen minutes. Do any of you need anything?” 

They shake their heads. Bill glances at Ben and then asks, last minute, for an additional glass of water. That’s when Richie sits forward and also requests a glass. 

“I can bring seven glasses of water?”

“That would be nice, thank you,” Ben says sheepishly. 

-

The nurse had been gone fourteen minutes, only reappearing to hand around glasses of water, which they’d all downed instantly, not realizing how famished they were. Ben laughed at that, saying freely that it made him feel bad. Richie smirked at him, eyes adoring and large behind his glasses. And yeah, Richie looked at all of them sorta like that- but he really, really admired Ben right now, for persevering. 

“If you’re thirsty, Benny-boy, there’s a lovely glass of charcoal waiting for you.” 

He grimaced- what Ben had done every time they mentioned it since it had been brought to his room. Eddie said it for him, though. “That looks disgusting.” 

Bill agrees. “Huh-heard it makes your s-s-shit turn black.” 

“Bill!” Beverly’s voice is shrill. 

Mike takes the cup and passes it to Ben, who wrinkles his nose and lifts it to his mouth. Right before it can touch his lips, he falls back in bed. Stan makes a noise and gets up from his chair. Beverly holds her hands out, ready to help him. Ben shakes his head. 

“I’m okay, I just feel..  _ weak.  _ I can’t even sit up.” He gestures plainly at himself with the hand not still holding his glass, uncomfortably collapsed back into the bed. 

Richie thrums his fingers rhythmically on the side rails. “Why didn’t you say so?” 

As if summoned, Mike and Bill go to his sides and help prop him up with pillows. None of them mention it, but Ben’s eyes are shiny with tears by the time he’s effectively lounging with no possibility of him falling again. They know he hates feeling weak- letting other people do stuff for him. Though, when Mike kisses his hairline, Ben murmurs a small  _ thanks.  _

And then he downs the charcoal in a single swig. That-  _ that  _ causes a wide variety of reactions- some of which being Stan, who let out a faint  _ oh my god  _ and put a hand to his temple, and Richie, who wailed loudly and slapped a hand over his mouth. 

“See, my darling, doing  _ that  _ is what landed you in here.” 

Bill watches worriedly as Ben puts down the cup, coughing roughly and grabbing at his throat. He notices there’s a small red mark under his nose from the tube that had been there. Eddie does too, apparently, and once Ben’s caught his breath, reaches up to tap him on the nose and lean his head against his shoulder. 

“Promise us you won’t do-  _ that  _ again.” 

“Drink,” Ben says. “Or  _ drink?” _

Eddie shrugs. “I don’t care, just don’t- you scared us.” 

Ben sighs. “I know.” 

“What made you do it?” Stan takes the glass from him. 

“I was out with coworkers and it was fun, it was good, but I really wanted to be home,” He starts. “One of them made a fat joke about one of the guys we’re working with- said he probably ate a horse every morning, and I, I remembered being a kid and hearing that all the time.” Beverly’s hand goes back to running through his hair. “It wasn’t about me remembering, but I just  _ hurt  _ for whoever was going through that because it hasn’t gotten any better. So I drank with them and tried to forget about it, and then they started talking- saying really horrible things about their wives, and I know you wouldn’t but-” He presses his eyes shut, resulting in worry lines between his eyes and on his forehead. “I imagined you saying those things about me.” 

“What were they saying?” Richie asks. 

Ben opens his eyes, being greeted with only kind eyes and non judgemental people whom he loves, and relaxes. “One said he could have done better but he keeps her around because she needs him anyway, and another told me his wife was the dumbest person he’d ever met. I just, I hate that they’re getting treated like that and I guess I got scared that maybe I’m dragging you guys down so I-I kept on drinking and I didn’t stop.”

“Baby,” Beverly says. “You graduated from Columbia, you’re one of the smartest people we’ve ever met.” 

“And we don’t ‘keep you around,’ Eddie tells him. “We love you. We want you here.” 

Bill nods his agreement. “We’re n-not the lucky six, we’re the lucky seven, and we always w-will be.” 

“It’s not just us, either. You’ve changed the world, Ben. You build sanctuaries for people and you make them feel at home. It’s more than blueprints and math- your existence has made other’s better.” 

He looks at Mike, finally not feeling timid or apprehensive under Mike impassioned stare. “Thank you.” 

“And,” pipes up Richie. “You make  _ our  _ existence better! You’re literally the best cuddle-buddy on the planet and you read through every one of Bill’s book drafts and you carry Eddie and Beverly whenever they ask- you even carried  _ me  _ once!”

Ben looks down, shoulders shaking with slight laughter. Stanley slips a finger under his chin and brings it up to meet his eyes. “We love you an unbelievable about, and we love you unconditionally. You’re going to get some sleep now, and wake up with us in the morning, and then we’ll bring you home.” 

“And you’ll shower,” adds Eddie. “Hospital grime.” 

“Ah, I brought some comfy clothes if you wanna ditch the hospital gown.” Mike holds up the folded clothes he’d kept with him. 

Ben beams. “Yes, please.” 

“Up, up,” commands Richie, snatching the sweatshirt from Mike’s hand. 

Ben tries to comply, but just in moving his legs off the side of the bed, he makes a strained noise and moves back into something like a fetal position. 

Spying the opportunity, Stan unties the hospital gown and rubs his back for a moment. “Nauseous?” 

“Mhm,” Ben answers. He shivers as Stan peels the gown off him. Richie passes the sweatshirt to Eddie, who smiles as he manuevers it around Ben’s shoulders and even though it isn’t really needed, helps to tug Ben’s arms through the sleeves. 

In a similar fashion, they slip on his sweatpants.

-

Long after the nurse picked up Ben’s empty cup and left, and long after Stanley reluctantly left the room to get them coffee while Ben slept, and then long after he came back, they shared a feeling. An unspoken one, but a feeling nonetheless. 

It started with looking at Ben, and the IV dripping fluids into his system, and his sober, sleep-heavy features. His lips were parted and his eyelashes fanned out over his undereyes. And it progressed with the heartache of seeing him startle awake when the blood pressure cuff around his arm activated once every hour. The feeling was found when one of them would sit up from their chairs- all being otherwise lucid because they couldn’t find rest when Ben was like this- and kiss Ben goodnight even when Stan insisted it was technically morning. 

That feeling was resolute love. It was the promise glowing in all of them that never would they ever forsake each other. They’d be there through thick and thin. They already had, and they definitely always will. 

Ben smiled in his sleep after one of the worst nights of his life for a few reasons. The first was Bill, who already had risen from his seat when Ben woke up. They spent about ten minutes like that, Bill crouched so that he could lay his head in his arms and be face to face with Ben. Bill told him a story that made him laugh, and laugh himself back to sleep he did. Not before Bill gave him a chaste kiss, though. 

The second reason didn’t even require him to open his eyes. As soon as he registered the pressure of the blood pressure sleeve turning on, he flinched. Apparently, Richie and Eddie both wanted their turn at aiding him in drifting back to sleep. 

“ _ Richie! You’re gonna trip over those wires if you get up, just let me-”  _

_ “- No way, you debbie downer! That’s my man. He’s been through a lot and I want to give him a kiss!” _

_ “Why don’t you talk a bit louder? I don’t think the entire hospital heard you.”  _

_ “Excuse you, I didn’t even wake up Stan!”  _

_ “I’m not asleep.”  _

_ “Really? You looked dead.”  _

_ “That’s not funny, Richie.”  _

_ “I wasn’t joking. Stan, you were so still you literally could have-”  _

_ “Beep-beep, Richie.”  _

Eddie’s chilly hand cupped Ben’s cheek then, and as Ben surrendered to Eddie’s stupidly soft hand,a little  _ awh  _ came out with Eddie’s exhale. “Sorry for being noisy.” 

He didn’t feel like opening his eyes. “It’s fine. Love you.” 

“You’re so cute.” 

“I second that, Eds! Ben  _ is  _ cute!” Richie’s breath hit the other side of Ben’s face, and he got a kiss on the cheek from each of them. 

Then Stan’s hair was tickling his nose. Ben giggled, throat still a bit raw, but he was cut short by Stan’s lips. 

“Goodnight.” 

“‘Night,” Ben says groggily before fading back into sleep. 

And then there was Mike who had set an alarm on his phone to sync with the blood-pressure cuff. Right before it went off, Mike had stationed himself at the foot of the bed- contorted into a mix between criss-cross and a child’s pose from yoga. The room was dark now, and besides the figure of Eddie and Bill in respective chairs, Mike was all he could see.

“The nurses told us to be careful with lying in the beds, so I won’t tell if you won’t,” he says. 

Ben smiles, using the remainder of his remaining strength to scoot closer to Mike. When he’s there, Mike plants a kiss above his ear before pulling up the blanket. 

When he wakes up next, Mike is gone but Beverly is there, with her hair tied into a bun at the top of her head which he thinks is adorable, and said head on his chest. She snores in her sleep, so he supposes that’s why he woke up. That, and the sleeve encapsulating his arm. Beverly stirs after a moment. The lights are still off, now he can’t really see  _ anything,  _ but he feels her head move and one of her eyes flicker open. 

She looks past him, to the glowing numbers on one of the machines. 

“Your blood pressure is fine, in case you were curious.” 

“What is it?” 

He hears her hum. “123/82.” 

“Hm,” he says, maybe too tired or maybe having forgotten the exact logistics of a healthy blood pressure. “I have no idea what that means.” 

Beverly laughs. “It’s perfectly average blood pressure.” 

“That’s reassuring. How are you?” He asks. 

“Are you really asking me how I’m doing when you’re the one lying in a hospital bed?” A few chuckles come from what sounds like Mike and Richie.

“Technically, you’re lying in it too,” Ben points out. 

“I’m fine, thanks,” Beverly drawls. “And how is the man who got his stomach pumped to hell and back?” 

Ben tucks a fallen lock of hair behind her ear. He knows he’s looking at her like she’s his world and he stops to think, breath catching in his throat, that she- and the others- look at  _ him  _ that way too. “Doing well, all things considered.”

-

The morning comes. With the rising sun in the windowless room, was the stirring of Ben to the rest of the six chatting with a nurse. A different nurse than last night, as they’d likely switched over shifts, but a nurse who was currently handing Beverly what looked to him like discharge papers. 

With a yawn followed by a groan that had no business escaping him, Ben decides to fully commit to waking up. The lights are back on, and they are blinding. He alternates between opening and closing his eyes until they adjust. 

“We can turn them back off,” Stan says, perceptive as always. 

“All good,” says Ben. 

The nurse approaches his bed. “How are you feeling?” 

Well, there’s a filthy aftertaste in his mouth from the charcoal, and the migraine of the century has begun to set in. He feels shaky and perpetually on edge with unwarrented emotions too, when the eyes of everyone in the room turn towards him, wide and full of cares to give. He feels unsure of where he’s going to go from today- back to work obviously, back home, but not back to his thoughts before. He feels unbearably,  _ unbelievably  _ tired. But most of all, he feels happy. 

“Much better,” Ben tells her. He means it, too. 

And as Mike and Richie help him out of bed, as Bev runs out to raid the vending machine, and Stan to pull up the car, as Eddie listens intently to the nurse’s final spiel, and then how Bill surveys them all with this bright, lovesick  _ look  _ as they get ready to leave; the deep rooted, ever-present feeling of emptiness that had abused him since he could comprehend it unwinds into something he’s able to pick apart. With an arm wound around Mike’s shoulders and Richie’s arm slung firmly across his waist, his feet touch the ground for the first time in twelve hours. 

Bill, Beverly, and Mike showever them in childish applause and Ben sniffs to keep his tears in his sockets when it makes him oddly emotional. Stanley walks back in, jiggling his car keys, as Richie is bending over to bow and Ben’s forced to support himself with an arm on Richie’s shoulder blades. Mike is laughing too hard to do much, but lifts a hand to hold Ben’s where it’s on his shoulders. 

But Stan smiles, small and soft and divine and says “we have ten minutes to get out.” 

“That a challenge?” Bill nudges him as he walks in. 

“Wait!” Eddie comes back through the curtain. “No, no. Legally we have to wheel him out.” 

“Legally?” Beverly asks, digging through her purse. The incessant squeaking of food wrappers in there makes Ben’s stomach rumble. Richie pats it, amused. 

Eddie nods. They know not to question him. Bill takes the handles of the chair and scoots it over to where Ben is standing. 

“I can walk,” he says meekly. 

“You can do  _ anything, _ ” Mike says. “But right now, you’re getting in this wheelchair.” 

He looks at Bill, eyes sparkling and perhaps legs shaking with the strange effort of staying on his feet. “That a challenge?” 

Bill smiles at that. 

Stan breaks apart from Beverly, where the two had been whispering to each other during the other’s exchange. He’s holding a rice crispy treat. “This is yours if you get in the chair.” 

He raises his hands in surrender, an impish smile on his face as Mike helps him into the chair. It’s tiny and his hip bones scrape against the sides. He doesn’t mind. 

“Okay,” Eddie breathes, satisfied. “How much time do we have?”

“Five minutes,” replies Stan tapping his watch with a bemused look on his face. 

Richie moves the chair back and forth slowly. “Ready? We’re gonna pedal you to the metal.” 

“Don’t you  _ dare _ ,” Eddie warns. Stan nods, too. 

“Why?” 

Ben listens as he carefully tears open the rice crispy treat. 

“What do yuh-you think, Ben?”

He takes a bite, and swallows it down. “I think we have four minutes left.” 

“Ta-ta,” says Richie, already pushing him out of the room. They hear Beverly yelp behind them and several footfalls. Ben grabs onto the handlebars and pushes his feet down. 

-

Richie pushes faster. “Wanna race them?” 

Ben laughs. “Why not?” 

They swerve, and Ben won’t deny that he feels like throwing up. They cut corners and startle a bespeckled doctor. Richie and Ben both say  _ sorry  _ as they zoom past. 

“Fuck, this place is like a maze, innit?”

-

Eventually, they find a way out and walk up to the car, much to a very unamused Stan’s chagrin. He’s leaning against the door with Bill, both sharing a packet of powdered donuts from the vending machine. 

“Thanks for shu-showing up,” Bill tells them.

Stan bustles them into the car- Mike, Beverly and Eddie in the very back, Ben and Richie in the middle, and himself driving while Bill is in the passenger seat. 

The drive is long. The air is thick with fog through the window Mike insists they keep open. Ben falls asleep almost immediately, finally free from the clinical stench of the hospital and among the people he knows love him most. 

And he knows this is only the beginning. He knows well that the medical stuff has been fixed, but there’s still a long way to go. It’ll be hard work. He’s okay with that. 

Though, he doesn’t mind focusing more so on the melodies softly playing through the car and the seven hearts beating together. The rest of the world can come later, he thinks, blissfully in the throes of sleep now,  _ this  _ is what will make him better. 

**Author's Note:**

> Kudos and comments make the world go round!
> 
> P.S: The title is inspired by Mitski's 'Brand New City'


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